sedere

Forms

sedere (first-person singular present sièdo or siédo, first-person singular past historic sedétti or (traditional) sedètti or sedéi, past participle sedùto, first-person singular future (now more common, especially in speech) siederò or sederò, auxiliary èssere)^[1] Literary present forms include seggo and seggono, and the archaic seggio and seggiono.^[2][3][4] Old Italian also had the infinitives Old Italian sedire and Old Italian seggere.^[5][6] As a noun: sedere m (plural sederi).^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin sedeō (“to be seated, sit”).^[7][8][9][1] The verb is panromance: French seoir, Occitan sezer, Catalan seure, Sardinian sèzzere and Romanian ședea; in Spanish and Portuguese it merged with the descendants of esse (“to be”) and gave part of the verb Spanish ser.^[8][10][11] Italian dialects mostly use other verbs: types like ⟨sentarsi⟩ in Veneto and Lombardy, and ⟨(as)settarsi⟩ in Piedmont, Liguria, Emilia and nearly all the South, while the standard verb belongs to Tuscany, eastern Emilia, the Marche, Umbria and Lazio.^[11] In Sicily Meyer-Lübke found it yielding to Sicilian assittari.^[10]

De Vaan reconstructs a stative Proto-Italic *sed-ē-, from a PIE Proto-Indo-European *sed- (“to sit”), with Umbrian forms and cognates such as Ancient Greek ἕζομαι (hézomai, “to sit down”), Lithuanian sėdėti, Old Church Slavonic сѣдѣти (sěděti), Old Irish saidid and Gothic 𐍃𐌹𐍄𐌰𐌽 (sitan), the relative of English sit.^[12][8][1] Latin set beside it sīdō (“to sit down”), from a reduplicated present like Sanskrit सीदति (sīdati).^[8]

The noun “bottom, seat” is the infinitive used as a noun.^[7][8][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the Dichiarazione di Paxia, before 1182 which lists “una tola da seder” (a table to sit at).^[7][13] The sense is “to rest the buttocks on a support, with the legs bent, stretched out or crossed”.^[7][9]

Semantic evolution

Brunetto Latini, before 1294, has the verb in the sense “to be situated”, of places, and Dante uses it for “to hold an office” that is carried out sitting, such as that of a judge.^[7][9] In a line of Dante a speaker says of her birthplace: “Siede la terra dove nata fui / su la marina dove 'l Po discende” (the town where I was born lies on the shore where the Po comes down).^[9][3] Petrarch, before 1374, has the reflexive sedersi and the infinitive used as a noun, “the act of sitting”.^[7]

As a noun the word first meant “seat, chair”, a sense Tommaseo records in old inventories,^[6] and with Franco Sacchetti, before 1400, the part of the body one sits on: “avea uno ciccione nel sedere” (he had a boil on his backside).^[7][13] Colloquial Italian has avere sedere, “to be lucky”.^[2][9] From the verb came sedia “chair”, probably by metathesis of an old sieda, and, from Latin derivatives sedile and sedentario.^[7]

Timeline

• Before 1182 – The Dichiarazione di Paxia has the first record.^[7]
• Before 1292 – Sedia in the sense “throne, seat of honour” in Bono Giamboni.^[7]
• Before 1294 – Brunetto Latini uses the sense “to be situated”.^[7]
• Before 1321 – Dante uses it of holding an office.^[7]
• Before 1374 – Petrarch uses sedersi and the noun sedere “act of sitting”.^[7]
• Before 1400 – Franco Sacchetti uses sedere for the buttocks.^[7]
• 1557 – Seduta “meeting, session” in statutes of Lucca.^[7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To sit, to be seated: Sedevamo sui gradini della chiesa.^[9][2][3]
2. To sit down, take a seat, usually as sedersi: Siediti accanto a me.^[2][3][1]
3. Of an animal, to sit: Il cane si è seduto davanti alla porta.^[9][2]
4. To hold an office, to be a member of a body: Siede in Senato da due legislature.^[9][2][3]
5. Of a court or an assembly, to be in session.^[9][3]
6. (literary) Of a place, to lie, be situated.^[9][3]
7. (transitive) To sit someone down: Siedi la bambola sul divano.^[9][1]

Noun

1. bottom, buttocks: È scivolato ed è finito col sedere in una pozzanghera.^[9][2][3]
2. (colloquial) Sheer luck, in avere sedere.^[9][2]
3. (archaic) A seat, chair; the seat of a chair.^[9][2][3]

Word family

• seduta
• sedia
• sedile
• sedentario
• sedente
• sediolo
• insediare
• insediamento
• soprassedere
• sederino

Related words

• sede
• Latin sedeō

Usage notes

The verb takes essere.^[1][4] The present has siedo and siedi where the stem is stressed, but sediamo and sedete; the future is siederò or sederò, the second now more literary.^[9][14][1] Set phrases include mettersi a sedere (to sit down), sedere alla turca (to sit cross-legged), sedere su due poltrone (to hold two posts at once) and, for the noun, prendere a calci nel sedere (to treat someone with contempt).^[9][4][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Devoto, Giacomo; Oli, Gian Carlo; Serianni, Luca; Trifone, Maurizio (2026), Nuovo Devoto–Oli: il vocabolario dell'italiano contemporaneo, digital ed., Milano: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Sabatini, Francesco; Coletti, Vittorio; Manfredini, Manuela (2026), Dizionario italiano Sabatini Coletti, digital ed., Milano: Sansoni / Rizzoli Larousse
4. ^ a b c Zingarelli, Nicola (2009), Lo Zingarelli 2010: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Bologna: Zanichelli
5. ^ Prati, Angelico (1951), Vocabolario etimologico italiano, Milano: Garzanti, p. 904
6. ^ a b Tommaseo, Niccolò; Bellini, Bernardo (1861–1879), Dizionario della lingua italiana, 4 vols., Torino: UTET
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
8. ^ a b c d e Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p De Mauro, Tullio (ed.) (2003), Grande dizionario italiano dell'uso, CD-ROM version 2.0, Torino: UTET
10. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
11. ^ a b c Battisti, Carlo; Alessio, Giovanni (1950–1957), Dizionario etimologico italiano, 5 vols., Firenze: Barbèra (reprint 1975), p. 3439
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ a b Battaglia, Salvatore; Bàrberi Squarotti, Giorgio (1961–2002), Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, 21 vols., Torino: UTET; digital ed. Accademia della Crusca, p. 18
14. ^ Vocabolario della lingua italiana Treccani (2011), Roma: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana